


Episode 15 - The Adventure of the Quiet Death

by stgjr



Series: "The Power of a Name" Series 2 - "Time Lord Triumphant" [16]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005), Multi-Fandom, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Crossover, Gen, Multiple Crossovers, Multiverse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-11
Packaged: 2018-10-16 18:22:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10576917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stgjr/pseuds/stgjr
Summary: A visit to 19th Century London leads our narrator and Katherine to the site of a mysterious death, a peculiar temporal signature, and an encounter with the finest detective of his time: Sherlock Holmes!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted on September 3rd, 2014.

**Episode 15 - The Adventure of the Quiet Death**  
  
Snow crunched under our feet as I escorted Katherine out of the TARDIS. Over her blouse and dress she had a heavy winter coat that fit the times while I had made sure to don a similar coat with a black bowtie. "You never wear ties," she said to me once we were out in the cold winter air.  
  
"Oh, I do when it helps to fit in better," I answered with a smile.  
  
"Where are we?", Katherine asked, looking up into a gas-lit lantern. "This looks very old."  
  
"Oh indeed it is." I smiled and led her out of the alley and into the street, where a horse-drawn carriage rambled on by. "Welcome, my dear, to the City of London circa... 1892, I think."  
  
Katherine blinked at him. "Really? The wonders of the all of the cosmoses and you bring me to Victorian London?"  
  
"Well, why not?", I asked. " _Victoria Regina_ and all. The heart of the Empire on which the sun never sets."  
  
"Because God didn't trust the British in the dark," Katherine retorted, smiling.  
  
I mimicked a pain in my left heart. "Oh, such a terrible barb. Although I do believe half of your blood is mostly English stock, isn't it? All of that love for Arthurian motif over on New Avalon?"  
  
"Descended from French through English, actually." Katherine looked around. "I thought it would be a bit more dirty. No environmental regulations and the like."  
  
"Well, this is hardly the Black Pearl," I remarked. "Rather nasty world... but not _that_ bad. But we are in one of the wealthier districts of the city, they do want to keep it looking nice." We walked along the road, taking in the sight of fancy houses. "So, shall we find a high class entertainment to enjoy? Perfect for that authentic Victorian England experience."  
  
"Well, I suppose so. Should be interesting from a historical perspective, anyway."  
  
We walked along, spying the lovely houses along the way. In the distance the steam whistles of coal-burning steamboats signaled our proximity to the Thames. A louder whistle spoke of a railroad not far from our location either, and around us carriages occasionally clattered their way down the streets, their drivers bundled up in thick winter coats. The winter air was brisk, a little bit of a bite to it, but altogether nothing compared to winter climes that a _Tharkadische_ like Katherine knew all too well.  
  
"If it's not the wonders of space it's something out of a history holo," Katherine finally said. "Do you think we'll ever run out of things to see?"  
  
"Through six dimensions of space-time? I don't think anyone can live long enough to see it all." I nodded to a passing man. "Good evening, sir." He gave me a nod and reply in return. "It should be New Year's soon, it would be interesting to visit Her Majesty. Preferably with no werewolves this time." I winked at Katherine. "Then again, I'd rather not give her the excuse to create Torchwood."  
  
"Some day you will have to tell me about all of these things, Doctor."  
  
"Some day, perhaps I shall. A birthday gift, maybe..." I began to think to myself on just how I could explain everything to Katherine - everything I hadn't yet - as we rounded a street corner. A glance at city signs told me we were drawing closer to the heart of London, the Strand and the Mall almost in our sights.  
  
My sonic came to life in my pocket. I reached in and pulled it out, drawing Katherine's attention. "Doctor?"  
  
"Well well, what have we here?", I murmured. The purple tip of the sonic lit up again as I ran a scan. "Temporal energies... oi, not good."  
  
"Are you saying there's some kind of.. time tear here?", Katherine asked.  
  
"Could be any number of things. A time machine... oh, wouldn't that be something, if we were meeting a fellow with one of those. Haven't met many solitary time travelers yet." I held the sonic out. "This way, my dear."  
  
  
  
  
The sonic led us around the corner once more and to a fine-looking city house. "Pennington Place," I read on the sign beside the main door. There was a tradesman's entrance around the side where I noticed a carriage pull up and permit a trio of figures to emerge, all in heavy winter coats. I didn't make out who they were as they disappeared around the corner of the building. "This way my dear." We walked up and around to the entrance, where I knocked.  
  
"What are you doing?", Katherine asked.  
  
"The source of the signature is coming from inside the building," I replied. I reached for my psychic paper as the door opened. A portly woman with graying hair answered. "Good evening, ma'am, I was..."  
  
"We already have the inspectors called for," the woman said irritably. "I won't have another of you muckin' out my poor master's house and makin' a nuisance of yourselves."  
  
As she went to shut the door Katherine took a step up and stopped her. "On the contrary. You will show the Doctor all the proper courtesy of a guest," Katherine declared in the air of, well, the Princess of the Federated Commonwealth dressing down a misbehaving palace servant. "He has come all this way to aid your master in his problem and you will not throw him back out into the cold!"  
  
Whatever resistance the woman had to us, it melted as the snow before Katherine's glare and demeanor. One could see the wires in her head flickering as years of education in bowing to the wishes of the upper class kicked in. "Oh, my apologies madame. I'm just so terribly upset about the old master and his fine child, I..."  
  
"The Doctor and I will overlook this discourtesy if you will so kindly move out of the way." Katherine's expression remained cold and strict as the servant did just that, allowing us entry into the house. Katherine shed her winter coat and, in the process, nudged me in the ribs to prompt me to do the same. I did so, revealing her light blue blouse and dress and my customary dark blue jacket with blue shirt and light blue vest underneath. The woman took our coats. "Everyone is in the parlor," she said. Now that we were closer I could see the red in her eyes; she had been crying. "Please follow me."  
  
We did so, staying a few steps behind. "I suspect their problem doesn't involve a temporal tear," I whispered to Katherine. "Still, it might prove an interesting diversion..."  
  
We were admitted to the parlor. "Gentlemen, this is..." The serving lady struggled for a moment. "...the Doctor, and his fine young... assistant."  
  
When we entered I looked around. There were two finally dressed ladies present, two more men in fine robes -clearly residents of the house as well - and four men in cloaks with a metropolitan policeman - a rather stereotypical "Bobbie" - with them. Two were clearly inspectors while the other two... "Oh ho ho," I murmured to Katherine. "This is good."  
  
And to cap it off, the oldest man in the room was seated in a chair... and rather clearly dead. I looked over him. His expression was one of terror. "Oh my, poor chap looks like he was literally scared to death."  
  
"And who might you be, sir?", the oldest of the gentlemen present - or rather still alive - asked. He looked to the others. "Did anyone else call for a detective as well?"  
  
"Sorry, I couldn't help but notice your troubles, had to take a look," I answered. I took a step into the room, looking around it. No indications of a struggle were evident. "I promise I am free of charge, I am simply investigating a... potentially related matter."  
  
"I am entirely familiar with all private and public detectives in the City," the tall man declared. "And I have never heard of one who has adopted the title of 'the Doctor'."  
  
Katherine crossed her arms. "Maybe it's because he's very good at keeping a low profile. And we do travel I must add."  
  
A condescending look crossed the man's face. "That I can believe, my lady. Might I ask where your family resided in Germany?"  
  
Katherine gave him a confused look. "Excuse me, sir?"  
  
"Your accent, while impeccable in its English, still shows the distinct qualities of German pronunciation from learning that language as a child. Given your bearing and refined speech, you are clearly a member of one of the noble houses of Germany, likely one with English ties, although I am quite certain you are not of Her Majesty's family given my knowledge of their issue." He turned his head to me. "By the same token, sir, your English accent is quite refined while your personal speech shows a certain bluntness that speaks to a practical man who is often not in the company of the more soft-spoken classes."  
  
Katherine stared in wonderment while I smiled. "Rather marvelous. Oh, quite marvelous. It is an honor, sir." I extended my hand toward him.  
  
"Doctor... do you know this man?", Katherine asked.  
  
"Oh, of course. I should think I would know those hawkish features anywhere. Not to mention that brilliant deductive reasoning." I stepped forward. "My dear Katherine, allow me to introduce these fine gentlemen to you. This gentleman is none other than Sherlock Holmes, the finest deductive mind of his time, with his companion and chronicler Doctor John Watson."  
  
  
  
  
  
  
I might be pardoned a certain manic giddiness. There are not many Humans with the mind and senses to be near Time Lords, and here I was standing with one, the great Sherlock Holmes himself. In the middle of a murder mystery no less!  
  
Well, okay, it might not be a murder mystery, but it was close enough.  
  
Katherine was rather stunned while Holmes took my hand. It wasn't from any warmth of course. Rather, I offered him another mystery to go with this one, and his brain demanded mysteries to solve to ease the agonizing ennui he so often succumbed to. It was no wonder the man took cocaine. In a timeframe before it was considered a bad drug, I will hasten to add.  
  
"I see you are familiar with my reputation and that of my friend Doctor Watson," Holmes said in his strong English tone. "I must say you have me at a disadvantage, sir."  
  
"Yes, well, I am not nearly as public. Usually. As for my traveling companion, her name is Katherine Steiner-Davion. She is an adopted neice of mine."  
  
There was a clearing of a throat. "Gentlemen, a man has died under suspicious circumstances," the lead police inspector reminded us. Something about his pinched in features made me think of a ferret.  
  
"It is quite all right, Inspector Lestrade." Holmes motioned to the man. "I have already made my examinations of Sir Theodore's remains and Doctor Watson will, I think, concur that heart failure was the cause. He died of extreme fright."  
  
"Or at least died _while_ frightened," I added. Looking around at the accoutrements of a well-to-do Englishman of the late Victorian period, I gathered facts from what he had present around. "A hunter, I see. East Africa?"  
  
"Yes, the Serengeti, given the lion skin."  
  
"And India. The tusk isn't right for an African elephant."  
  
"My uncle Theodore was with the Colonial Office," one of the younger men replied. "He invested well in the colonies and was wealthy when he returned home."  
  
"These are Cecil and Rodney Pennington, the brother and nephew of Sir Theodore," Lestrade said. Indicating the older of the two ladies, he continude, "And Mary and Elizabeth Pennington, the younger sisters."  
  
"There is no Mrs. Pennington in either case?", I inquired.  
  
"Our dear wives departed us in the past year," Cecil Pennington lamented.  
  
"And what of Theodore's son?", I asked.  
  
Holmes looked with interest at Cecil. "A son? You had not mentioned that."  
  
Cecil shrugged. "Oh, poor Peter. He's not well in his mind, sir. Not well at all. He barely recognized his father on the best of days."  
  
"I see." Holmes' keen eyes scanned the room again. "Who has moved the curtain?"  
  
My eyes looked over to the curtain showing the snowy city outside. It had indeed moved by several centimeters. My eyes narrowed as I looked to Katherine, who shrugged. No one was stepping up to take responsibility either.  
  
"Oh, please Holmes, the curtain?" Lestrade shook his head. "Come along, Inspector Loughlin. I shall show you proper police work. Everyone with me to the parlor, we shall have questions answered."  
  
They all filed out of the room, leaving me and Katherine. " _Sherlock Holmes_?", Katherine asked, incredulous.  
  
"Of course," I answered. "Why not?" I pulled out the sonic screwdriver. "Please mind the door."  
  
"Mind the door for what reason, sir?"  
  
We both turned and saw Holmes and Watson re-entering. I saw Watson's hand going for his pocket and undoubtedly his revolver. "There will be no need for that, Doctor Watson," I said, holding my sonic up. "I simply wanted privacy for the use of my little tool here."  
  
Holmes looked at it with intrigue. "An interesting device, sir. How would you use it?"  
  
"Oh, the sonic screwdriver is quite versatile, and has many uses." I held it to the late Sir Theodore Pennington and turned it on. The purple tip lit up and the soft whirring sound of the screwdriver replied to me. I glanced at the small display built into the base. "Heart failure, as expected. And I see we have some damage to the man's liver. Heavy drinker, but not enough damage for it to be a lifelong habit."  
  
"Bourbon and rum, as well as champagne," Holmes recited, although it was clear he was more interested in the sonic screwdriver. I looked up and followed his eyes to the bottles on the shelf, beside a set of papers and a pen as well as other minor things. "And I shall note that the maid is the only servant in the house despite sufficient room for two more."  
  
"Suggesting Sir Theodore's wealth was running low," I murmured. I leaned in and smelled his mouth. While there was already the pungent odor of death and the unfortunate release of bladder and bowels that usually accompanied it I detected a hint of another odor still in his mouth. "He has had quite a quantity of rum tonight, I'd wager."  
  
"Yet there is no glass near him." Holmes looked at the glass cabinent. "And all glasses in the room are fresh."  
  
"I can look for the maid and ask," Katherine offered.  
  
"Stay put for the moment, young lady, until we settle things," Holmes insisted. I looked up from where I was finishing my examination of the dead man to see Holmes standing at the curtains. "They have been moved, as I suspected. At least half an inch. Yet none were near them to move them."  
  
I found that curious so I looked up and over at where he was standing. It was a good ten feet across the room from the deceased's chair. My eyes narrowed as I looked, intently, at the carpet at Holmes' feet. "I agree," I said. "The carpet fibers at that side are slightly compressed from someone standing on them recently and at some length."  
  
Holmes knelt over and pulled a magnifying looking glass from his jacket pocket. He looked at the carpet himself. The very image of that.... oh, I felt a chill then. I was working a possible murder mystery with _Sherlock Holmes himself_.  
  
It had been quite a while since I felt that giddy rush of getting to work with such a titan.  
  
Holmes stood to his full height again. He turned to me and I could see his eyes burn with fierce curiosity. "What are you, Doctor?"  
  
"I beg your pardon, sir?"  
  
Holmes stepped across the distance quickly and faced me directly. "You are correct. The fibers are compressed from someone standing upon them recently and at length. But the compression is a a slight one, indeed of such slightness that I could barely perceive them despite using my glass and being on top of them. You perceived them from ten feet away, Doctor. That is a feat that no Human eye could reasonably accomplish."  
  
"Are you implying the Doctor is some sort of... space alien?", Katherine asked, with not a hint of irony in her voice. She was quie good at that.  
  
"I have no facts to imply _anything_ , my lady, save that you are most assuredly Human and the Doctor is beyond Human."  
  
I nodded and looked to Watson who was still plainly ready to draw his revolver. "Doctor Watson, do you have your stethoscope with you?"  
  
"I do," he confirmed.  
  
I walked over and got into a vacant seat. I deftly slipped open two of the buttons on my shirt. "Would you be so kind as to listen to my heart?"  
  
Watson nodded and took the 19th Century tool out of his bag. He walked up and slipped it into my shirt over the heart. I could see the quizzical look on his face so I took his hand and moved it to the other side of my chest. His eyes widened with shock. "My God...", he breathed.  
  
"Watson?" There was unmistakable urgency in Holmes' voice.  
  
"This is impossible, Holmes," Watson insisted. "This man has two hearts!"  
  
Holmes rushed over and took the earpieces from Watson. He listened as I moved the receiver over both of my hearts. "How remarkable," he murmured as we looked eye to eye. "What are you, sir?"  
  
"I am a Time Lord," I answered quietly. "We come from a planet called Gallifrey. I travel in a craft called the TARDIS that allows me to traverse six dimensions of space-time." I looked over at Katherine. "Katherine is my traveling companion and a Human like you."  
  
"But not of our world either," Holmes reasoned. "Some... alternate world then? The daughter in an aristocracy?"  
  
I nodded. "She travels with me sometimes, when she is not busy with her duties to her family and the interstellar empire they rule."  
  
"Amazing," Holmes said. But I could see some of the interest was fading. One mystery solved by a quick observation and now he was focusing on the other mystery at hand; the death of Sir Theodore Pennington. I suspected that once this mystery was done he would take a step back and allow his curiosity about what I had said to lay claim to his mind. "And your tools are the product of your advanced society?"  
  
"They are."  
  
"Then, sir, why are you here?"  
  
I help up the sonic. "Because there is something in this house that drew my attention. And it may even have something to do with this man's death. I came to investigate that."  
  
"Then we should continue the investigation," Holmes said, standing up fully while I re-buttoned my shirt. "The maid, Miss Hagerty, has not yet been questioned. And she may know something more of the house."  
  
"I got the distinct feeling she was in grief over her employer's death and worried for the boy Peter," I said. "Perhaps we..."  
  
And that was when we were interrupted by the scream.  
  
  
  
  
Everyone had scrambled into the kitchen by following the scream. We arrived just after Lestrade and the others. He was leaning over the body of the maid Miss Hagerty, her face contorted into absolute terror. A broken decanter was near her body. "Poor Hagerty," Mary Pennington said. "She was a kind soul."  
  
I leaned over, drawing a dirty look from Lestrade as I breathed in the odor in her mouth. "Rum," I said. I looked back to Holmes. "Just like Sir Theodore."  
  
"Are you suggesting, sir, that someone poisoned them?", Cecil Pennington demanded.  
  
"Nothing is being suggested," Holmes replied. "The facts of the case are being compiled... and what have we here?"  
  
Holmes knelt down beside me and pulled open the late maid's hand. A strip of paper was in it. He pulled it out and read it. "'Protect my boy.' And it is in the late Sir Theodore's handwriting."  
  
While they spoke I stood up and kept my sonic screwdriver in my palm. But there was no point in using it; all of the glasses in the kitchen were now soaking in a tub. If there had been any poison in the rum, it would be beyond detection now. I looked back and scanned one of the shards of the broken decanter, but there was nothing.  
  
"Can you prove poison, Holmes?", Lestrade asked pointedly.  
  
"I can prove nothing yet, Inspector. We need more data!"  
  
"Where is young Peter Pennington?", I asked.  
  
"Upstairs, in his room," Rodney said. "You mustn't disturb my cousin, sir, he is not right in his mind."  
  
Watson took his turn, asking, "How old is the lad? Are there indications of what is wrong with him?"  
  
"He is sullen and withdrawn," Elizabeth Pennington complained. "He wouldn't even stay around his poor father."  
  
"The boy is five years as of last month," Cecil clarified, noticing that even Lestrade wasn't satisfied with the stonewalling.  
  
Indeed, the Penningtons were starting to become quite suspect to me at that point. Of course, the fun with these mysteries is that whatever is apparent at first can quickly prove far more complex than it first seems.  
  
"I'd like to see him regardless," I said.  
  
"I must insist that you leave him alone," Cecil growled. "And if this continues I shall go speak to my barrister."  
  
As he said that I noticed he flicked his eyes toward his younger sisters. Yes, there was something here. A family feud, perhaps?  
  
"Who else is here?", Holmes asked.  
  
That brought looks. He indicated the floor toward the pantry. In some of the soapy water that had spilled when Hagerty fell there were the outlines of shoes. "None of us have stepped over there," Holmes pointed out. "Someone else has been in here."  
  
I noticed Watson put his hand on his revolver again.  
  
"What, is it a spook Holmes?" Lestrade shook his head. "A phantom in this house frightening the residents to death? Let's stick with facts, sir. And right now this looks like a poisoning to me." He looked to the Penningtons. "I'll be taking their bodies to be examined."  
  
"Do what you will," Mary Pennington said coldly.  
  
"As for the boy, I should like to see him as well," Lestrade said.  
  
"I would rather you not..."  
  
Rodney stepped in. "No, Aunt, the Inspector is being reasonable. I shall take them up to see Peter."  
  
"I would like to see the lad too," I said. "I have some experiences with people in bad mind, maybe I can help."  
  
"I won't be having frauds experimenting with the child," Mary demanded.  
  
"I'll make sure he doesn't, ma'am." Lestrade motioned to us. "And I know you wish to come as well, Holmes. Let's see if your phantom is upstairs, eh?"  
  
Holmes hid whatever irritations he felt toward Lestrade underneath a steady expression of interest.  
  
"That inspector is being rude," Katherine whispered to me in complaint as Rodney Pennington led us toward the stairs leading to the bedrooms.  
  
"I think the Inspector is a man who favors the practical and what he sees, not the theoretical," I replied diplomatically.  
  
Katherine nodded and said nothing as we ascended to the second floor and took a right. The last door before what was presumably the late Sir Theodore's master bedroom was locked. Rodney put a key in and opened it. Inside there was only a single gaslight burning to provide illumination. Toy soldiers and books lined the shelves in rigorous order. On the bed was a boy, brown haired like his older cousin, who didn't even give us a glance as he read from his book. "Peter, these are the gentlemen investigating your father's death," Rodney declared. "Be kind to them." When Peter didn't react he looked to us. "The boy acts dumb at times. He rarely acknowledged anyone save Miss Hagerty." Rodney looked back at him. "Miss Hagerty has died, Peter. These gentlemen are trying to find out why."  
  
The boy lifted his head slightly. I saw a tear form at the side of his eye but nothing more. Watson and I stepped forward, my eyes scanning the room further. The toys were rigorously lined up on every shelf, as were the books and the clothes. The bedroom was meticulous for a five year old. Watson knelt beside the boy and tried to look at him.  
  
I went to the other side. "Hello there Peter. I'm the Doctor, and this is my friend Doctor Watson. We'd like to make sure you're okay, alright? It's for your Dad."  
  
"Why can't I cry?", the boy asked in a low voice. "I want to cry for my father. And for Miss Hagerty. But I can't."  
  
Watson checked the boy's vitals. "He seems healthy."  
  
"It is his mind sir," Rodney insisted.  
  
"Or his brain." I pulled out the sonic and ran it over Peter's head. At seeing the result I shook my head and sighed. "Poor lad is autistic."  
  
Watson looked at me. "Sir? I am not familiar with that."  
  
"Yes, it's a condition that won't be widely understood until well into the 20th Century," I explained. "It is a disorder of neurological development. Those who have it suffer from a variety of symptoms that makes it hard for them to interact with others socially. The worst cases can become so bad as to be at risk for repeated self-injury." I looked over Peter's room. "See how he's kept his room? Every object, every toy, meticulously lined up. Obsessive-compulsive behaviors are another sign of the disorder."  
  
"Sir!" Rodney stepped forward and took my shoulder. "I really must insist you leave my poor cousin alone now."  
  
I gave him an irritated look. "I'm not harming him." As I looked around the room I felt like something was off. Terribly off. My Time Lord senses were, well, tingling. I brought the sonic up. "Have any weirdness happening lately, Rodney?"  
  
"I have no idea what you mean sir," Rodney protested.  
  
"I think this has gone on far enough," Lestrade said. "The coroner should be here shortly. I will go with the bodies and come back to hold further interviews. You gentlemen may chase phantoms all you..."  
  
Lestrade was interrupted by a shrill scream from down the hall. We all rushed out of the room in some semblance of order and found Cecil and Elizabeth Pennington converging on an extra room. "Mary!", Cecil shouted. "Mary!"  
  
Another scream answered him.  
  
When we got to the door it was locked from the inside. Holmes nodded to Lestrade and they prepared to slam the door. "Wait!" I held out the sonic and ran it over the lock. The sonic couldn't effect wood, but the metal lock was easily undone. I threw the door open with Lestrade and Holmes on my back.  
  
The stench that hit my nostrils was not ordinary death. It was something far nastier. I looked at the smoking, still burning remains of what had been Mary Pennington and shivered. "Ozone," I said, sniffing the air. An electrical current? Here?  
  
The thought of the temporal tear came to me again. Clearly it _was_ involved in what was going on, or at least in this death.  
  
"My God, Mary!" Elizabeth ran over to the body and knelt beside it. She broke out crying. "Who would do this?!", she screamed, tears running down her cheeks. "Oh God, why?!"  
  
I looked around at them. Rodney's expression was shock and dismay. Cecil's was the same. But there was a twitch in his face. Not that it would make me suspect him of this death, no... but there was _something_ to it. A guilty conscious?  
  
Of course, that begged the question of how a Victorian-age man electrocuted a woman in the middle of her room with no electrical outlets to be found.  
  
"The electrical current required for this would be enormous," Holmes remarked. He looked back to Lestrade. "Do you care, Inspector, to speak of phantoms now?"  
  
Lestrade drew in a breath and shook his head. "I can't explain this either, I'll admit. This is your area, Holmes."  
  
"And mine." I held the sonic up. The temporal energy was strong here, but not its strongest. I was sweeping it around....  
  
"Watson, what's wrong?"  
  
Holmes was looking to his friend. I turned and saw he had pulled his revolver out. There was some fright in his face. It was quickly being replaced by confusion.  
  
From beside me Katherine let a sudden cry of surprise. I turned around, leading to me facing the door, which slammed. Or at least, that's how it played in my memory. The truth was far more frightening.  
  
I felt something on my right hand. Looking down I saw my left hand was gripping a marker I kept for, well, any use I might need a marker for.  
  
On my right hand was a single stroke from the marker. A black mark on the back of my hand.  
  
A black tally mark.  
  
Realization struck me, followed by horror. "Oh no," I murmured to myself, as other sets of eyes focused on me.  
  
"Doctor, what's wrong?", Katherine asked.  
  
I found myself wishing I would have some other reason to mark my hand, but I knew there was only reason I would do so. Especially like that.  
  
"I know what killed Mary Pennington," I said hoarsely. "We are all in grave danger."  
  
"Grave danger from what, sir?!", Cecil Pennington demanded.  
  
My eyes met Holmes'. He could see the extent of my fright.  
  
"It's the Silence," I said. "The Silence are here."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our narrator and Sherlock Holmes must work together to unravel the mystery behind the Silence and the murders in the Pennington home before another victim is claimed.

Now I think it's understandable that the response to my words was... blank confusion. "Silence? What are you babbling about?", Lestrade asked.  
  
"They're a race of beings with a form of automatic hypnotic suggestion," I answered. "The moment you turn away from them, you forget you saw them." I held up my hand and the mark on it. "This is how we know they exist. This and automated audio recorders that are over half a century away from being invented."  
  
"Preposterous," Cecil Pennington declared.  
  
"Not preposterous, simply improbable," Holmes corrected. "And nearly impossible to prove conclusively. On the other hand, it would explain why we have seen signs of the presence of another being."  
  
"And it would also explain the deaths of Sir Theodore and Miss Hagerty," I added. "Death by fright at seeing a strange creature."  
  
"But if don't remember seeing it, how can we stop it?", Katherine asked me.  
  
"It's not invincible, bullets will hurt or kill it easily enough." I nodded to Watson. "The trick is keeping it in sight. We should stick together, all of us. Safety in numbers."  
  
"What, all night?", Elizabeth complained. "How will we sleep then?"  
  
"We need to find it, not wait around." I motioned to the door. "We go together, room by room, and seal each room behind us once it's been cleared. We don't give it anywhere else to run." I held up the sonic.  
  
"But Doctor, this thing could just leave the house and get lost out in London," Katherine pointed out.  
  
Holmes shook his head. "No, this 'Silent' being is clearly interested in this house and this family. Whatever it is planning, it is remaining here to do it."  
  
"Come, Holmes, a creature that makes you forget it exists when you look away?" Lestrade scoffed. "That's far beyond even your usual flights of fancy."  
  
Holmes turned and faced Lestrade. He motioned to the remains of Mary Pennington. "Clearly there is something beyond our experience in this home, Inspector. I can vouch for the Doctor's extraordinary nature myself and now a woman has been electrocuted to death in a room with no electrical sources. And we have indications of an extra presence that none has seen. While we have nothing truly conclusive about this 'Silence' creature, the evidence is clear that there is _something_ here."  
  
"After we seal this room, we should get pens," I said. "I didn't bring enough markers for us all. Remember that if you see anything, call it out immediately and mark your visible skin somewhere obvious. We can keep track of how many we've seen then."  
  
The Penningtons did not look enthused at all, but Cecil nodded in agreement. "I had hoped to get this sorry business over with", he lamented.  
  
We filed out of the room. When we had all left I took the sonic and ran it over the closed lock, magnetically sealing the lock so that it was mechanically impossible to open it until I unsealed it. "There are pens in my brother's bedroom, he did book-keeping there," Cecil offered.  
  
"What shall we do about young Peter?", Watson asked. "Clearly we can't allow him to be left alone with a monster on the loose."  
  
"I shall seal his room after we have checked it," I said. "It is along the way."  
  
We returned to the room to see the boy still quietly reading, paying us no mind. I had thoughts about trying to interact with the boy further, but I was worried about attempting the obvious method; telepathic content. Mind-reading was something I would rather not force into the already-overwhelmed beings around me. Plus, even with fine control, the mind of an autistic five year old trying to mix with that of a Time Lord was... very unsafe.  
  
I swept the room and checked my hands. There were no extra marks. No one called out either. We filed out of the room.  
  
As we did so, Peter looked up. "Are you after the bogeyman?", he asked.  
  
Holmes and I looked back. "What was that, Peter?", I asked.  
  
"The bogeyman," he repeated. "He comes by sometimes."  
  
I shared a glance with Holmes. "Can you describe the bogeyman, young man?"  
  
He shook his head. "I can't see him."  
  
"Then how do you know he's here?", I asked patiently.  
  
Peter lowered his eyes. "I don't know. I just do," he said meekly.  
  
I pulled the sonic back out. "The background temporal energy of this room is different from the others. There is something here." I looked into the crowd. "Katherine? A moment?"  
  
Katherine walked up and joined Holmes and I. "Yes, Doctor?"  
  
"Katherine, in all of your social work, how much contact have you had with the autistic?"  
  
"Some," she answered. "I've visited care facilities for them. I've seen the cases before."  
  
"Do you think you could get through to Peter? I believe he may have the key to what's going on here."  
  
Katherine looked at the sad little boy on his bed and looked back to me, sympathy shining in her eyes. "I do, Doctor."  
  
"I'll seal you in with him," I said. "If worst comes to worst, you can get out the window."  
  
"Pardon me, Doctor, but you presume this creature cannot force the room," Holmes pointed out. "If he can generate enough electrical energy to kill a man he can force the door. Leaving an unarmed woman alone with a boy who can sense it and is therefore a threat is not reasonable."  
  
"You have a suggestion?"  
  
"I do. Watson can stay with her. He is armed and I have scarcely met a braver man."  
  
I thought it over in my mind. "Yes, that makes sense. I don't like reducing our numbers that greatly, but it would be easier than making the boy come with us given his condition."  
  
"An understandable concern." Holmes looked to the others who were busy looking down all sides of the hall. "Watson, Miss Steiner-Davion will be remaining with the boy, can you look after them?"  
  
Watson nodded briskly. "Of course, Holmes. They will be safe." He leaned in and I could hear him whisper, "Be careful, Holmes."  
  
"Don't worry, Watson, I shall be fine," Holmes reassured him. I could see Watson was not quite so satisfied. It was understandable; I was a mystery to both of these men, something extraordinary and inhuman, and therefore I was something potentially dangerous.  
  
"Right. Let's keep going."  
  
  
  
  
Once we had checked the late Sir Theodore's room Cecil Pennington when to his desk and retreived his pens. "Sir Theodore has made great use of his desk as of late," Holmes noted while watching him. "While drinking."  
  
I looked at the desk. "The ink stains near the ink well?"  
  
"Exactly. And the stain in the shape of a glass, on the right side of the surface."  
  
"What was he working on, I wonder?" I continued to look around. There was a small fireplace in the room, the house being old enough to where such was expected. I noticed a few scraps in the pile and went over to look down at them. I scanned the room at that moment, seeing how the others were reacting. Lestrade was trying to buck up his young trainee Loughlin. Elizabeth Pennington was standing off to the side with young Rodney. They were whispering to reach other, but even my hearing couldn't quite make it out from that distance. Cecil was busy at the desk finding all of the pens. Certain that nobody was looking I reached toward the scraps of white within the gray and quietly slipped them into my pocket for later review. "The Silent scares two people to death and outright kills a third. Why?"  
  
"You operate on an assumption, Doctor, that this creature was responsible," Holmes replied. "We do not have the facts to support this."  
  
"We know it wants something here," I pointed out. "It is something of a leap to assume that the two cases are unrelated."  
  
"Indeed, but perhaps not related in the fashion you propose," Holmes replied. "Why would it change its methods? This thing must have reason."  
  
I let that rumble in my brain as I brought the sonic back out. "The temporal signature in this room is higher than any others save the boy's. If this is a result of the Silent's presence, then it has spent a lot of time in here." I began to reach in my pocket. "I found these...."  
  
Lestrade interrupted me at that point. "Gentlemen, if you have these pens, I suggest we move along and get started on this phantom hunt?" There was still quite a bit of skepticism in his voice.  
  
"We can discuss your find later," Holmes whispered. I nodded in agreement; we were going to be together for the rest of the hunt and anything found would be overheard by the Penningtons.  
  
  
  
  
It has been my custom to tell my tale from my point of view alone, but I feel it best to relay what Katherine told me after the fact of her stay in the sealed bedroom with Watson and Peter.  
  
Watson took a place watching the door, observing it carefully while Katherine sat beside Peter. "My name is Katherine," she said to him. "Peter, I know you must be scared and upset with yourself, but I have seen other children like you. There's nothing wrong with you as a person."  
  
"My father is dead," Peter said to her. "And Miss Hagerty.  Miss Hagerty always brought me cheese crumpets when I was sad. She hugged me when my mum died. She was a nice lady. I'm supposed to cry. I don't cry."  
  
Katherine had enough experience with the autistic to know that trying to set a reassuring hand on him would only make him feel worse. "It's quite alright, Peter. I know you're a nice boy." I imagine she gave him that soft smile of hers as she said that, leaning over slightly with her blond hair framing her face. "This bogeyman, Peter. Do you know what he is?"  
  
"He's a bogeyman," Peter answered her.  
  
"And you're scared of him?"  
  
"I don't want to talk about the bogeyman," Peter said. "Aunt Mary gets mad at me about the bogeyman. She says she wants me to go away."  
  
"Your Aunt Mary has died, Peter," Katherine said to him. "The bogeyman killed her."  
  
Peter evidently did not choose to react to that at the moment. "Aunt Mary doesn't like me," he finally said to her. "Nobody in my family likes me. I'm bad in the head. I shouldn't have been born."  
  
"Come now young man." Watson looked over at him. "Get your chin up, your family cares for you."  
  
"Uncle Cecil said I was in the way. That my mum shouldn't have had me."  
  
"Well, that's an awful thing to say," Katherine said. "He was probably just angry with something, he didn't mean it."  
  
Peter blinked at her. "He said I didn't deserve my daddy's money."  
  
Watson furrowed his brow. "Really?"  
  
"They don't think I hear them," Peter said meekly. "I just don't know how to talk with them. I didn't know how to talk with my Daddy. I loved my Daddy but I didn't know."  
  
Katherine felt bad for the poor boy as the tears formed in his eyes. She watched the same happen in his small eyes and used her hand to brush his cheek. "I've met other children who had the same problems, Peter. It's not something you can help. Just remember your Dad loved you."  
  
At her words Peter nodded. And Katherine watched as a smile crossed his face while the tears ran. "I'm crying," Peter said to her. "I'm crying for my Daddy and for Miss Hagerty. Thank you."  
  
I suppose that in the storybooks this was when the boy would have hugged Katherine. But he didn't. One shouldn't be surprised given his condition. It was quite the breakthrough for her, just to get him to open up that far. Katherine gently rubbed his head as the boy quietly sobbed and looked toward Watson. Watson nodded at her. "It's a sad thing to see such a good-hearted child afflicted," he said to her.  
  
"They didn't even wonder about him," Katherine said. "You were the one who reminded everyone he was alone."  
  
"Yes." Watson's expression must have turned dark at that point, I can surely imagine it. "And I'm sure Holmes and your friend the Doctor noticed as well."  
  
"I know they'll figure it out." Katherine paused for a moment to wipe Peter's eyes again. When she looked back to Watson she asked, "What is it like, sir? Working with Mister Holmes?"  
  
Watson's expression brightened again. "Oh, it is quite the rush, young lady. I got my share of adventure with the Army in Afghanistan, mind you, but that was war, and Holmes' adventures are...." He shook his head slightly. "Well, they are quite a change. Whenever the chase is on Holmes transforms before my eyes, from lethargy to excitement and I can hardly keep up with him. He is not the easiest to get along with, of course. He sees every detail and his mind is so fast you must wait for him to explain it."  
  
"I know that feeling," Katherine said in turn, smiling.  
  
"And what of you, young lady? Adventuring with this... strange man, this Doctor?"  
  
I can only imagine Katherine's wide smile as she thought about an answer, familiar as I am with her feelings about it. "Oh, it is... extraordinary. I can't begin to describe the things I have seen, the things we've done together. The Doctor has shown me worlds far beyond this one, even beyond our galaxy. I've seen stellar nurseries where stars are born, I've seen great stars collapse into black hole or explode into supernovae that would dazzle any one. He's shown me alien worlds where cities cover an entire planet and stations where millions of people live in the void of space."  
  
I can imagine her hushed breath as she said those things and Watson's expression at hearing it. "It must be like an explorer visiting unknown shores," Watson mused. "Seeing things no other man has seen before. And with something like that man..."  
  
"Oh, very," Katherine told him. "There are things out there, monstrous creatures and beings and alien empires... you can't do this and be timid. And that's not what the Doctor is. Whenever we face these horrors, that's when he gets this grin on his face and yells 'Run!' like he's about to start laughing. And we run and run.... and he's still smiling because no matter how nasty or powerful or dangerous the monster is, the Doctor's already outsmarted it."  
  
"It sounds quite frightening," Watson remarked.  
  
"It can be frightening, yes. But the fear never quite takes hold of me, not when he's there. He's never afraid of the things in the dark. They're afraid of _him._ "  
  
As you can tell, I had perhaps overshot the mark in making myself into Katherine's hero. And it likely led to some disturbing implications on what I was in Watson's mind, whether I was conning Katherine in some way or every bit the ferocious being she made me sound like, and therefore even more dangerous.  
  
Whatever his thoughts, his response to her was to say, "It seems that our companions have given us both quite interesting lives."  
  
"Yes." Katherine nodded. "They have."  
  
  
  
  
The upper floor had given us nothing. With all of the bedrooms sealed we went to the first floor, where the extra rooms could be searched one by one. I felt frustration build, joined by irritation at the smug look on Lestrade as our hunt started to feel like a snipe hunt. The first floor was going to prove the hardest; there was just too much space.  
  
"This is becoming preposterous," Elizabeth complained. "I'm not sure what happened to Mary, but to think it is some creature that we can't remember seeing...."  
  
The mood of the people around me made it clear they were all growing just as frustrated. My own frustration was mounting. There were just too many questions left unanswered. How many Silents were there? I'd seen only one but there could be more. How did it get here? What was its interest in the the boy and the Pennington household as a whole? Why did it kill Mary Pennington?  
  
"This is just about enough," Lestrade said. "Holmes, you can continue this business if you like, but I have more important duties."  
  
"Yes, the remains," I remarked. "Well, go ahead, Inspector. Hopefully there won't be more bodies to collect when you get back. Do you want to go collect the cooked remains of Miss Pennington, by the way?"  
  
"I'll have the coroner's wagon come by for those," Lestrade answered, frowning at me. "Come along, Loughlin."  
  
The other Penningtons were on the far side of the parlor when Lestrade and Loughlin left. While they weren't looking I motioned to Holmes and pulled out the scraps I'd retrieved from the bedroom fireplace. "Someone burned papers recently," I explained, showing them to Holmes.  
  
Holmes took one scrap while I took the other. I could see the remains of figures, money figures given the "p"s and "s"s and £s in the unsteady hand of Sir Theodore. "Financial accounts," I murmured.  
  
"Someone did not want these recovered," Holmes remarked. "Would these Silents care?"  
  
"I am not certain. Their mode of operation is suggestions left when you face them, they use it to influence others into taking actions they require." I looked around the room.  
  
"Were it not for the fate of Mary Pennington and your own nature, Doctor, I would be convinced this was a spectacular fraud of some kind."  
  
"In your case I would agree with you." I put my hands together. "We need more information."  
  
"Perhaps there are papers in Sir Theodore's room that could be of help," Holmes suggested.  
  
I shook my head. "If anything incriminating was there, it was thrown into the fire." I breathed in. "He left a note asking for his son to be protected. He knew something was wrong. He _suspected_ something."  
  
"Which means that if he had sensitive documentation he would not place it where it could be easily found." Holmes looked out the door of the parlor. "The maid?"  
  
"If his family was involved in something, that's too obvious," I pointed out. "But maybe one of the vacant servant quarters?"  
  
Holmes nodded in agreement. "The house was built with three servant bedrooms, on the north wall."  
  
We left the parlor and the Penningtons behind. It was admittedly dangerous to do so. I would have preferred keeping an eye on them and, if they were innocent, we were potentially abandoning them to murder. But I was not about to cajole them into following, not if they were up to no good.  
  
Holmes and I went into the back and looked into the servant's quarters. The first room provided no surprises. We were in the second thereafter. I admired the early Victorian appearance of the room, the green wall patterns and the like. It had a fireplace, the only one among the servant quarters so equipped. I looked at it intently while Holmes investigated the bedding. "How long has this room been vacant, do you think?"  
  
"At least three months," Holmes suggested.  
  
"I thought so. Look."  
  
Holmes looked over to see where I was at the fireplace. In the ash and dust at the base there was the outline of a sole, perhaps a slipper given how light it looked. "The dust was disturbed recently." While Holmes examined the bottom of the fireplace I reached up into the chute for the smoke. As my hand grasped around I felt my fingers wrap around a tube of sorts. I gripped it and pulled it loose. "What have we here?" The tube was made of cheap tin. The top pulled loose in a second and I emptied the contents into my hand; rolled up papers. I offered one to Holmes. "Sir Theodore's private papers. Specifically, a new will." I read it over quickly. "Everything is being left into a trust for young Peter. The family is being given a small sum and rental rights to a property in the country. But it will remain in the trust for Peter."  
  
Holmes leafed through the stack I'd given him. "Ah, quite interesting. Sir Theodore's bank accounts have been draining away for years now. This would explain the reduction in the house staff quite well."  
  
"And the drinking," I agreed. I found another bank record. "And what do we have here? A new bank account with Holder  & Stevenson, signed in by Alexander Holder, verifying his charge of the trust for Peter."  
  
"It must be quite the sum with these withdrawals."  
  
"One hundred thousand pounds," I noted. "My my, quite the nest egg. It appears to be virtually all of his remaining worth."  
  
To remind people from later eras with that lovely beast of inflation, one hundred thousand pounds in 1892 Britain was about, oh, one or two orders of magnitude, depending on purchasing power calculation or economic value.  
  
Holmes' jaw set. "A very plentiful motive for murder, Doctor."  
  
I nodded in agreement.  
  
And that was when I noticed the new tally mark on my right hand.  
  
My eyes widened and I looked over at Holmes.... in time to see that he was looking at the small "S" he had apparently placed upon his own hand. He blinked in confusion. "Well. It appears I have some confirmation of your claims," he said to me with a faint grin. "I have no knowledge of placing this mark on my hand, but it is clearly mine."  
  
We looked up toward the door, now open. I quickly secured the papers back into the tube. As we went to the door I spied an empty dressed and secured the tube under one of the drawers quietly. We stepped into the hall and I turned to seal the door with the screwdriver.  
  
When I looked up Holmes had his hand up and palms outward. Elizabeth Pennington stood in front of us, an angry scowl on her face.... and a revolver in her hand. "Put your thing down, sir," she demanded. "Or I will shoot you both."  
  
  
  
  
While I was having a gun pointed at me by a distraught woman, Katherine was trying to comfort Peter Pennington under Watson's watchful eye. "It all seems preposterous," Watson finally admitted to her. "Creatures that can make you forget you've seen them the moment you look away? I can more easily accept a man with two hearts than something so bizarre."  
  
"The whole of creation can be a bizarre place, Doctor Watson," Katherine pointed out.  
  
Watson heard her but had his attention diverted by something else at that point. "Do you smell anything, young lady?", he asked.  
  
Katherine sniffed in the air. "It smells like... an oil?"  
  
"Paraffin," Watson clarified - for Yanks, that's kerosene - as he approached the door. He looked down at the floor and undoubtedly saw it pouring under the door. "What is..."  
  
It was at that moment that the oil was set on fire.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our narrator and Sherlock Holmes race to protect their companions, and little Peter Pennington, from a killer.

Holmes and I watched the revolver tremor in Elizabeth Pennington's hands. I saw tears forming in her eyes while her breath proved ragged and unstable. "Why couldn't you just leave? We would have taken care of my poor stupid nephew! It didn't have to be this way!", she shouted at us.  
  
"You poisoned your brother," Holmes said, his voice level with a steely calm.  
  
"He was going to throw us out!", Elizabeth raged. "All of us! Even when I didn't do anything! All because of...."  
  
As she stuttered in a mix of rage and terror, Holmes said, "Your family was spending away his fortune."  
  
"I just wanted a husband!", Elizabeth cried. "I didn't want to be a spinster! But he always rejected my suitors! And then I became too old and nobody would look at me! I... I'm not like Mary!"  
  
I swallowed and nodded. "What was your role in this? Elizabeth, you can still come out of this with dignity intact, but you must lower the gun."  
  
"It's too late. He'll kill me. He'll...."  
  
I stood beside Holmes enough to slip my right hand under my jacket and begin pulling out the sonic disruptor. Elizabeth was so wrapped up in facing Holmes she didn't realize I was moving until it was too late. "Put that down! I'll shoot!"  
  
I held up the sonic disruptor. "You don't look like the bad sort, Elizabeth," I said. "Which member of your family was it?"  
  
"Put it down, now, please!" The gun in her hand was tremoring.  
  
"Doctor..." Holmes gave me a sideways glance.  
  
I set the disruptor to 42, of course. But I would rather talk her down. A shot might ricochet off the protective dome and hit her. "Elizabeth, cooperate with us and there can be mercy. You can get out of this alive. But if you pull that trigger, you'll either be killed by the Silence or by a hangman's noose as a conspirator to murder."  
  
Elizabeth tried to redouble her grip on the gun. Tears streamed down her face while the gun shook erratically in her hand. Finally it just clattered out of her hands and she fell to the ground. Holmes came up and scooped the firearm into his hand. "A good choice," he assured her. "There is mercy in British law."  
  
"It's Rodney," she cried. "He... he found out about the new accounts and that my brother was taking us out of our inheritance. He wouldn't let that happen. He studied medicines and chemistry."  
  
"And he poisoned the rum tonight," I said, following her words. "He found one of the many poisons that would not be detectable to modern science, Indeed, one so quickly metabolized by the body that even my scans didn't find a trace."  
  
"He's going to kill Peter," Elizabeth said. "He's gone mad from anger."  
  
"Come along, Miss Pennington," Holmes said. "We will...."  
  
And that was when we heard the next scream.  
  
  
  
  
The fire leapt up from the front of the door. "Murder!", Watson shouted.  
  
Katherine took Peter and brought him over to the window. She had gotten close enough to the boy that he did not resist. She thought of the snow outside the sill and decided against it as, once melted, it would only serve to spread the fire more as water. "The blanket, Doctor Watson!"  
  
Watson caught on immediately, stripping the blanket off of the bed. He and Katherine took opposite ends and went up toward the spreading oil, much of it now aflame. They began beating on the flames with it, seeking to smother them. But more oil was pouring out under the door and undoing their work. They beat faster at it just for the blanket to catch fire. The flames and heat forced them to pull back. Watson motioned to the window. "Go! I shall secure the sheet while you carry the boy down!"  
  
"And what about you?"  
  
"I shall follow, if I still can," he promised. It must have been rather clear that he was likely to get burned, but Doctor Watson was as Holmes proclaimed; a brave man, one willing to endure sacrifice in a manner entirely befitting the ideals of a Victorian Englishman.  
  
Katherine threw open the window, allowing the cold London air into the room. The cold air had minimal effect upon the flames, governed as they were by the spreading oil. There was no time to properly tie the entire sheet into a rope. Watson kept hold of the end and secured it to the footboard of the bed. Katherine picked Peter up. "Hold on to my neck, Peter," she said to him upon picking him up. This freed her hands to take the sheet. She stuck one leg out, then he other. She slipped her knees off of the sill....  
  
And then a gunshot buried itself into the brick beside her.  
  
Katherine looked down to see a man in a hooded jacket looking up at her, glaring frusration. His pistol was raised and poined right at her. "What are you doing?!", she demanded.  
  
The attacker replied with another gunshot. Katherine realized he meant to shoot her and Peter dead if she continued to climb down, so she did the only thing she could do. She pulled him back up into the bedroom.  
  
"If we go down, we'll be shot," she told Watson, crawling back in.  
  
"And we shall burn to death up here," Watson pointed out.  
  
Katherine brought Peter over to a corner. "Stay here, Peter. We will keep the fire from you, okay?"  
  
The boy nodded to her.  
  
"Doctor Watson, we may be able to buy time by using the bed." Katherine went back over to it and floorboard, pulling the bed out enough that she could reach the mattress. "Take the other end."  
  
"Of course." Watson saw what she was doing and grabbed the other end. They picked it up and moved it to where the fire was spreading to the middle of the floor. They brought the mattress down hard on the flames, smothering them, and picked it up immediately again. They repeated this step several times, slowing the advance of the oil and the flames consuming it.  
  
But it was too late at that point. The fire was spreading to the structure proper, consuming the wood in the floor and the wooden shelving. Soon the mattress caught fire and they were forced to drop it. The flames continued to move toward them. When Watson peeked out of the window again the gunman below shot at him. "We are trapped," he said.  
  
With nothing left but hope, Katherine cupped her hands and called out.  
  
" _ **Doctor!**_!"  
  
  
  
  
While our faithful companions were fighting fires and gunmen, Holmes and I were taking the frightened, broken Elizabeth Pennington into the parlor. The smell of ozone hung in the air. Smoke still clouded around the burning remnants of an arm chair. The only sign of its former occupant were scraps of burnt fabric and a ring that was beside my foot... and still attached to the charred remnant of a ring finger.  
  
At the sight of that, Elizabeth Pennington finally had too much. Stress and terror overwhelmed her and, after a moment's cry, she toppled over. I sighed. It was all so... so... _Victorian_ , fainting ladies. I couldn't imagine the women I'd worked with fainting like that. Usually it took something more. Like that belly full of tesseract beer and ryncol that had brought Commander Shepard down at the reunion party...  
  
....granted, that was an unfair comparison for Miss Pennington. But most available comparisons would be unfair to her. It wasn't a very fair time for ladies, as her complaints about her oldest brother had shown.  
  
Holmes picked up the ring. Despite some slight warping the letters "CP" could be made out upon the gold. "It appears your monster has claimed him before we could," Holmes said.  
  
We checked our hands. No new marks.  
  
I checked around the body while Holmes took the unconscious Elizabeth to a bed. I found papers and picked them up. "Old letters," I noted. "The late brothers exchanged rather heavy correspondence during the elder's time in the Colonies."  
  
"It is not uncommon."  
  
Reading the letters I got the feel of Cecil Pennington as a man who missed his brother, loved his wife, and doted on his son. Perhaps too much. Theodore admonished him repeatedly to be strict with the boy, that laxity would make his son a wastrel, and that severity did them no harm. Theodore, admittedly, came off as a bit of an ogre.  
  
 _And then he married and had his own son_ , I thought. _A son with a neurological condition beyond his ken. And yet the boy was not abused. How Cecil must have felt, seeing his brother even more doting toward his own flesh and blood...._  
  
At the bottom was a letter signed by Cecil and given to his brother.  
  


> _Rodney has told me of your new will and your accounts. I can understand punishing Mary, dear brother, for her excesses, and I admit myself guilty of my taste for the races getting the better of my judgement. But Elizabeth only seeks a house of her own and Rodney, why, he has such grand plans for the family money, no less grand than your own plans were from your Colonial Service! Why must we all be punished for the transgressions of the few? And for your poor child, everything? The boy will be the mark of every confidence man and trickster in England! Why, Theodore, are you being such an ogre..._

  
  
"There is Cecil's motive," I stated. "His son had ambitions with the family fortune. Giving it to Peter fostered his resentment."  
  
"Rodney is the center of this murder plot," Holmes said. "We need to find him."  
  
"We should return to the others first," I said. I checked my hand. No new marks yet. "I know you're here, somewhere!", I shouted. "You're protecting the child, aren't you?! That's what this is about! You were too late to save the father and the maid from murder so you are putting down the killers to protect the boy!" I turned about and checked my hand again. No new marks.  
  
"Doctor...."  
  
I motioned to Holmes. I was not done. "Leave this woman alone, she has repented her small role in the evil done here tonight! She does not deserve death!"  
  
I checked my hand. Yet again there were no new marks.  
  
"You are not the Doctor."  
  
The low and rough voice ringed in my mind. When I looked at my hand again, a new mark was there. I saw I was now facing Holmes, who had a similar tally mark on his hand. Elizabeth Pennington was awake now, her face white with fear. The pen we'd give her earlier that night was in her grasp, but no mark was made. "Rodney made the poison, Mary put it into the rum," she whimpered. "Cecil and I were to find the papers and burn them."  
  
"She has confessed. She is spared," the voice said.  
  
"What did it mean?", Holmes asked. "It said you were not the Doctor."  
  
"I will explain later," I answered. "Suffice to say there is a famous Time Lord known as the Doctor and I decided to hold myself to his standards." Horrible thoughts were crossing my mind. "Rodney Pennington means to kill Peter. We have to protect him." I left the parlor with Holmes on my heels. As we approached the top of the stairs I could hear a cry at the edge of my hearing. "Katherine." I redoubled my pace.  
  
  
  
  
In the room Katherine and Watson had fallen back to the corner as the flames continued their inexorable march toward new fuel, and thus toward them. Both were coughing and were forced to slide down against the corner, shielding Peter Pennington as best as they could. "Doc..tor!", Katherine coughed, still trying to get my attention.  
  
"Holmes.... are you.. there?!", Watson managed between his own harsh coughs.  
  
I can only imagine how it looked to them when the door burst open, blasted off its hinges. I came in with the sonic disruptor, its deep whirring noise filling the air with the purple tip lit up and waves of invisible force smothering the flames until even the embers were out. Holmes and I went to our respective companions. I could see the glimmer of genuine warmth, and concern, in Holmes' usually passive face as he helped Watson to his feet. I did the same for Katherine. "Good thing I've got great hearing," I said.  
  
"Yes," she chuckled, coughing again. I patted her on the back. "How did you do that?"  
  
"Oh, my newest alteration to Setting 4. Setting 4HD. Specifically for fighting fires."  
  
"Why HD?" The moment after her lips curled into a smile. She'd gotten the joke.  
  
"Well, you remember the last time we had to face a kerosene fire," I said by way of answer, since she didn't really need one. "The designation seemed fitting."  
  
"Harry will probably give you that special frown of his when he finds out," Katherine laughed.  
  
I looked over to where Peter was looking around his ruined bedroom. This got more tears than finding out his father had died, specifically the burnt books. I picked the worst case up and opened it. To his clear relief, the pages within were singed on the borders but all the text was legible. "There you go, young man. Your books are fine."  
  
"Doctor, someone was shooting at us from the outside," Katherine told me, no longer coughing.  
  
"Young Mister Rodney, I presume," I said.  
  
"Indeed," Holmes agreed. "The fire was as much to block our way as it was to kill you. Then he went back down the staircase and out the tradesman's entrance to the alley to shoot you should you flee."  
  
"That beast," Watson growled. "So it is not this monster, Holmes?"  
  
"No, Watson. The so-called monster has instead been taking the law into its own hands."  
  
As if to punctuate that, the alleyway outside lit up. A young man screamed and a gunshot went off, following by a crackling of lightning and a second scream followed by silence.  
  
"And now there is only one," I said. "Elizabeth Pennington confessed everything. The plot and the poison was Rodney's. Mary administered it. She and Cecil were minor accessories tasked with finding Sir Theodore's paperwork and destroying it to ensure the old will was enacted."  
  
"And so the case is solved," Watson said. He looked at Holmes with a little dejection. "I am afraid I cannot chronicle this one very well, my friend."  
  
"You are aware of my feelings about your usual work, Watson, so it is of no concern to me. And if you could chronicle it, I suspect this case would be lumped in with the works of Vernes and Wells given our new acquaintances and their prominent roles."  
  
"Quite true," Watson agreed.  
  
"Actually, you're only half right, Doctor Watson," I then said. "We have one mystery left." I pulled out my sonic screwdriver. "Where did this Silent come from?"  
  
"Pardon, Doctor?"  
  
"They don't usually work alone like this," I said. "And we have seen indications of only one being present. It got here somehow. And given the temporal energy in this room I believe I have a good guess as to how. Young Peter, a moment of your time?"  
  
"Did the bogeyman send you?", Peter asked softly.  
  
"Not quite." I noticed the look on Watson and Katherine and knelt down beside Peter. "He's been protecting you, right?"  
  
Peter nodded.  
  
"Tell me, Peter, where did the bogeyman come from?"  
  
"Where all bogeymen come from," Peter answered matter-of-factly. He pointed to his bed. Or, specifically, under it.  
  
"The imagination of children," Watson mused aloud. "Quite good to see the lad talking, at least."  
  
"Possibly not just imagination in this case." I held the sonic toward the bed. "The energy readings are higher over there. If you gentlemen would be so kind as to help me move the bed?"  
  
We each took an available corner, Holmes and I at the foot and Watson by the head. The bed was heavy but Holmes was deceptively strong and I was a Time Lord, so it was no great effort. I looked down at the floorboard beneath the bed. "And now our final mystery is solved," I said quietly. I had been expecting the sight before me.  
  
A Crack.  
  
"It's a Crack in the Universe," I explained, kneeling over it with my sonic screwdriver. I scanned it actively, allowing the thin sliver of white light pouring from it to shine in my face. "Six dimensions of space-time ruptured at this very spot."  
  
"Astounding," Holmes said in a low voice. The light danced over his intelligent eyes. "I could never have imagined."  
  
"Don't get too close," I warned. "Some Cracks can literally erase a man from all of history." I looked at the sonic results. "It's drawing in energy from your world. Don't you feel how chilly it is now, right on this spot? That's the drawing in of thermal energy. The last time I saw a Crack do this it was starting to freeze an entire planet."  
  
"Such could be the fate of our own, then? And how could you prevent such a thing?"  
  
"I have a means." I stepped away. "Stand by the door, please," I asked them all. I brought out the TARDIS remote and summoned it to me.  
  
Due to the lack of room in the bedroom I summoned it to my very spot, so it materialized around me and placed me in the main control room. I went straight to the central console and began working on it. Behind me the door opened. Katherine led everyone inside. Peter looked about, impressed. "My word," Watson breathed. "How is it bigger on the inside, Doctor?"  
  
"Pocket dimension," I answered. "Dimensionally transcedental technology. Makes for easy internal redecorating. Hit a button and I have more storage space." I turned to face them. "This is my TARDIS. That's 'Time And Relative Dimensions In Space'. She can move anywhere in six dimensions. Yes, that includes the basic three, so she can fly..." And here I switched to a _sotto voce_ tone and volume. "...but between you and me boxes don't make for the most aerodynamic craft shape."  
  
"I am astounded, good sir," Holmes said. "This is sheer magic."  
  
"Well, Clarke did say - sorry, _will_ say - that sufficiently advanced technology looks like magic," I answered. "And speaking of that, we have a Crack to seal up from those same base three dimensions. That'll keep it from turning this planet into an orbiting snowball."  
  
I rushed down to the lower level and got out my Crack-sealing devices. Holmes and Watson remained with Katherine on the upper level, looking around. "And you say there are more rooms in here?", Watson asked.  
  
"As many as I want or need, Doctor Watson," was my reply. "I even have a library. With a swimming pool for added benefit." I went to work connecting the devices to the heart of the TARDIS.  
  
"So you actually live in here..."  
  
"We do," Katherine said. "Well, not always for me, I must say. I must go home at times and see to my duties."  
  
I came back topside with the devices. "Gentlemen, I am afraid I must dragoon you into something rather beyond the standard for a man of Victorian England," I informed them. "Please, each of you take one of these devices. You will fire them at the Crack at my word and for Heaven's sake do _not_ cross their emissions, which will be tricky given how small this Crack is."  
  
"Leave it to us, Doctor," Holmes answered, hefting the device I gave him like it was a hunting rifle.  
  
"Indeed, we are no stranger to the rifle," Watson added.  
  
"It's a good thing it's not in mid-air this time," I murmured, going back to the controls. "Okay, I'm going to be relying on my Time Lord senses for this one. Katherine, please observe the Crack as well and tell me if the light within it starts to surge. I must be precise."  
  
"Yes, Doctor."  
  
I began opening up the Time Vortex Regulator. My Time Lord senses felt the shift of energy in the Crack even from within the TARDIS. Not as well as someone who had been exposed to it for a long period would have, or a being like a wizard with personal experience in personal temporal manipulation, but well enough for such a small Crack. "Gentlemen, now!" I watched and felt carefully as the energy poured out from their devices and covered the Crack completely. As the energy surged I closed the Regulator; when it felt like the energy in the Crack was slipping I opened it back up.  
  
"Doctor, I think it's closing," Katherine said. "The Light is starting to fade."  
  
"Yes, just a little while longer, gentlemen!", I called out.  
  
More energy covered the floor of the bedroom in response, the two men quietly going about the extraordinary task I had set them to. "The light is gone, Doctor!", Katherine called out. "The Crack is gone!"  
  
"Cease now, gentlemen!" I closed the Regulator completely.  
  
The energy ceased. They looked back at me, a little sweat on their faces from tension. "How exciting," Watson breathed. "Extraordinary, sir!"  
  
"Yes, it has been rather fun. Wouldn't you agree, Peter?" I looked down at the boy.  
  
He shook his head. "Where's the bogeyman?"  
  
"Oh, he's probably hanging about..."  
  
"Down Watson!"  
  
Holmes tackled his friend to the floor of the TARDIS. A gunshot rang out and a bullet ricocheted off of the handrail fo the TARDIS and planted itself into the wall. "Oi, who's shooting in my TARDIS?!", I shouted, taking up my sonic disruptor and looking out the door.  
  
At the broken open door of the bedroom stood Rodney Pennington. Half of his face was burnt and scarred and his eyes were wide with hate and terror. A fully-loaded revolver was steady in his hands, pointing towards us. "I don't know what you did! I don't know what that was!", he screamed, sounding half-mad. "But I bloody well killed it! And now I'm going to kill you all!"  
  
I went for my sonic disruptor but had to take cover before I took a bullet, which buried itself into the TARDIS control. Rodney stepped into it and swung his eyes around madly. "Where is that little bastard?! Where is the dumb little bastard?! He cost me everything! I would have made our family, great! Great! And he...."  
  
Peter wrenched himself from Katherine's grasp and raced at his older cousin with all the fury of a five year old driven to rage. "My room! My books! My dad and Miss Hagerty!", he screeched, painfully unaware of the danger as he slammed into Rodney's knee before he could fire. The boy sank his teeth into Rodney's leg and drew a howl from his enraged cousin. That got him a slap on the back. A gunshot rang out and drove Holmes and Watson back into cover. I brought my sonic disruptor up to stop him and had a bullet graze my shoulder for my trouble, knocking me over before I could trigger the disruptor. Rodney brought the gun back over and pointed it at his little cousin. "I hate you!", Peter shrieked. "The bogeyman will get you!"  
  
"Rot you little...."  
  
What happened next I have had to reconstruct from audio records for obvious reasons. The gun in Rodney's hand barked again. But the rounds did not strike little Peter. Rather, something else. Something else I have no memory of seeing, only the blood I found on the TARDIS walkway to confirm it was there.  
  
The Silent had thrown itself in front of little Peter to shield his body and it had worked. It - or "he" rather - fell to the floor with a groan of pain and a thump. Rodney still had a couple rounds left but now he could not use them. Holmes and Watson rose, Watson with his trusty service revolver and Holmes with the revolver taken from Elizabeth Pennington. Their firearms barked out in tandem and blood erupted from Rodney's body. The foul young kinslayer dropped dead upon the floor of the TARDIS.  
  
I scrambled over to the Silent. Obviously I have no memory of this and my memories of what I said are disjointed, aided by the audio record the TARDIS kept. "I'm sorry," I said to the Silent, scanning him with my sonic screwdriver. "Your wounds appear mortal."  
  
"I was too late to save the father and the maid," the Silent rumbled in reply. "But the child lives. The aunt has confessed her sins and been cleansed. I have been of service."  
  
"I know I will not remember this," Holmes said to the creature. "But I respect your accomplishments here, sir. You have acted as any good man should."  
  
Watson knelt beside him as well. "Are you sure there is nothing we can do?", he asked me.  
  
"I'm afraid, my dear Doctor Watson, that this being's case is beyond even your skillful surgical expertise," I answered. "In case I am able to remember, sir... how did you get here? You came through the Crack."  
  
"I... do not know," the Silent rasped. "We were attacked by surprise. I transmatted out to get help and awoke beneath the boy's bed."  
  
"Where were you?", I asked the Silent. "What world?"  
  
It didn't answer. There was a sharp breath and it went still.  
  
And so the solution to the puzzle of the Cracks continued to elude me.  
  
Peter began crying. "My bogeyman", he went over and over, holding the Silent's remains presumably. "Why did my bogeyman die?"  
  
"Because he felt there was something more important, lad. You."  
  
I embraced the weeping child as he cried for the alien that had given him companionship and, in the end, a future.  
  
  
  
  
The case was rather clear cut to Lestrade when he returned. "Aliens who make you forget you've seen them. What imagination. Did you honestly fall for that Holmes?"  
  
"I only consider facts as I see them, Lestrade," Holmes remarked calmly. "As it stands, the facts I have discovered bear out a more human behavior behind this case."  
  
"Yes. Sir Theodore, laid low by his own family. And then they start blowing each other up over the spoils." Lestrade shook his head. "A disgrace. A good thing that you and Watson are such able shots, Holmes. It's never easy to take a lad in the coroner's wagon."  
  
"It never should be," I remarked in a low tone.  
  
"And you, 'Doctor'." Lestrade looked over to me. "I hope that the next time we may see each other, you bring more common sense and less rubbish. A good thing you had Holmes here, God knows how this might have gone if you had continued your silly phantom chase."  
  
"I am ever so grateful for Mister Holmes' guidance," I humbly answered. "A good night to you, inspector."  
  
"Good night, sirs, ladies."  
  
Lestrade left with what was left of the three Pennington conspirators. The repentant Elizabeth was holding her silent nephew in the parlor. "I never realized he could be such a sweet child," she murmured, running a hand in his hair as he read the book in his hands. The pages were singed, the cover almost unrecognizable... but it was _his_ book, and he was still enjoying it.  
  
"His condition can be complicated," Katherine told her. "It changes how the brain develops and impedes the ability of someone to socialize. But given time and loving patience, madame, he will be a great nephew to you."  
  
"I will care for him without reservation," Elizabeth promised.  
  
"Excellent. I look forward to seeing young Peter growing up," Holmes said. The slight hint of a smile curled upon his face. "It shall be lonely here, I think. I know a widower gentleman for whom I did a case recently. A very kind and patient man, I must say. If you would agree to a holiday meal of some sort, Miss Pennington, I could be certain to arrange the invitation to him."  
  
Elizabeth blushed and nodded. "I would be honored, Mister Holmes."  
  
Ah. Well, I supposed that would handle that. I'm sure some might feel... uncomfortable about the prospect of marrying her off solving problems. But we are products of our times, and there are worse things, I suppose, than a happy home, regardless of how one feels about the idea of marital bliss as the ultimate cure for all that ails a woman.  
  
"Doctor." Peter looked up at me, so I knelt down on my haunches before him, balancing myself carefully with my ankles. "Why couldn't anyone see the bogeyman? Why doesn't anyone remember him?"  
  
"Oh, my lad, we remember him, but..." I smiled gently. "there was something... special about the bogeyman that made people forget him once they couldn't see him anymore."  
  
"Then how come I remember him?"  
  
"Because you're very, very special, my lad." I tousled his hair. "I shall have to bring you a book one day."  
  
Peter tilted his head slightly. But he seemed to accept my answer and left at that.  
  
  
  
  
The TARDIS had been removed from the house at that point. I deemed it best to not shatter Lestrade's illusions. The four of us returned to it and, with a quick flip of a couple switches and a pull of the lever, we materialized in front of 221 Baker Street. "It looks rather cozy in there," I said to them as Watson and Holmes stepped out.  
  
"I expect Mrs. Hudson shall have a decent enough meal readied for us." Holmes looked back at me. "Doctor, there is one question I still have on this case."  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"How did the boy sense the presence of that being when we all forgot he existed the moment we lost sight of him?"  
  
A good question indeed. "I suspect a combination of factors," I answered. "Peter was exposed to the Crack's energies as well. It undoubtedly gave him a sense of the Silent's presence. Just as well, his neuro-developmental disorder has caused his brain to be structured differently, changing the effect of the auto-hypnotic suggestions of the Silent's appearance." I fiddled with something on the TARDIS control, just out of sight of them. "I was wrong, Holmes. Thank you for keeping me from leaping to conclusions based on my prior knowledge of the Silence."  
  
"Prejudice is an easy habit, Doctor," Holmes answered. "It interferes with the interpretation of fact in insidious ways, even the clearest mind can fall to it."  
  
"Yes." I pulled an object out of one of my many "junk piles" and set it against the TARDIS control. My shoulder itched from the graze wound, but I would heal it rather fast.  
  
As I focused on my work, Katherine allowed the two gentlemen to give her kisses upon the fingers, in proper fashion. "It has been my pleasure, gentlemen," she said to them. "Thank you, Doctor Watson, for helping me."  
  
"The thanks are yours as well, my lady," Watson said. He smiled at her. "Take good care of your Doctor out there."  
  
"And you take care of Mister Holmes. I suspect he needs you more than he lets on." Katherine gave Holmes a grin.  
  
Holmes did not react openly on that remark. He did, however, concede with his words. "Without Watson as my companion and chronicler, I suspect my work would be very dull indeed." He looked back to the door to their house. "Mrs. Hudson should have our late dinner out, and some choice words on our late return as well. Come, Watson, a repast should settle us down for a nice hibernation this evening."  
  
"One moment, Holmes." I came back to them with an object in my hand. It was of polished oak wood, but that was just the exterior; inside was a battery-powered playing device I had rigged up with a long-life battery. "In lieu of an excellent chronicle of this case by the good Doctor Watson, I would like to present this to you. Please, press the central button."  
  
Holmes took it and did so. " _I was too late to save the father and the maid..._ " The Silence's voice came out from the bottom. "By Jove, a voice recorder of some sort? Of far greater quality than a phonograph."  
  
"And with an internal battery that will last a century," I added. "It's a recording of everything that happened while we were looking at the Silent. That way you will never forget the grand finale to this extraordinary night."  
  
Holmes clasped the device for a moment before placing it into his pocket. "I thank you, Doctor," he said warmly. "A handsome gift."  
  
"You're welcome." I offered him a hand.  
  
This time Holmes took it without reservation. "Doctor, in all of your travels, if ever you should find a problem that challenges your intellect, do remember that my door is always available for a gentleman needing a consultation on a difficult case. Doctor Watson and I will be glad to assist you on any cases that may come your way."  
  
"Thank you kindly, Sherlock. I will keep that offer in mind." I reached into my own pocket and pulled out a second device. "This is a temporal beacon," I said as I handed it to Holmes. "Should anything... extraordinary happen again, should there be any case of Cracks in the sky or monsters prowling your city and country, you need only press that button on the top of the device to call upon my aid."  
  
Holmes nodded and, for the first time, gave a wide smile. "Should either possibility ever come true, Doctor, I look forward to working with you again."  
  
"As do I."  
  
I let them go at that point, as it was rather chilly. Katherine and I watched them enter the front door from the entrance to the TARDIS before I closed it and went to the central controls. "Well, that was fun, wasn't it? Holmes has a form of autism himself, you know. He's got Asperger's. Not a bad case, but it's there. It's no wonder he can't help himself with solving puzzles."  
  
Katherine walked up to me. "Doctor, you've never mentioned these 'Cracks' before. What's going on?"  
  
I looked to her and kept my face neutral. "I've found them a few times before. Before you started traveling with me. I have no idea what's causing them. But that's not the greatest mystery."  
  
"No?"  
  
"No." I sighed. "The Cracks have been in four places now. This world, Harry's world, the Discworld, and a 21st Century Earth inhabited by, among other people, a rather formidable law agent named Leroy Jethro Gibbs. The metaphysically soft world Cracks were sending energy out and the metaphysically strict worlds were pulling it in. Why? Why do soft worlds gain energy and hard worlds lose it?"  
  
"And where are the Cracks coming from?", she asked.  
  
"I don't know, but I have an idea on an origin point now," I replied, my voice lowering. "The Gelth on the Discworld, and now a Silent in Holmesian England."  
  
"I don't get the significance, Doctor?" She blinked. "You look... frightened."  
  
"Just worried, my dear," was my reply. "Just a little worried."  
  
Not just worried. I was excited and frightened and bewildered all together. Once was coincidence, twice? No, I was pretty sure where the Cracks went toward now. Somewhere that, even with the Cracks open, I couldn't lock my TARDIS onto.  
  
The Doctor's home cosmos.  
  
And as I stood thinking about it, I felt a bit of fear as well for Harry and Gibbs and their respective circles of friends and co-workers. If the Gelth and Silence could go through the Cracks.... _what else could have gone through?_  
  
It would be some time before I found out. We shall get to that... eventually. For now, I had a graze wound to treat and more sights to show Katherine. So, with a pull of the TARDIS control, we were off again.  
  



End file.
